


How Can I Keep You

by Darkhymns



Series: Colloyd Week 2020 [7]
Category: Tales of Symphonia
Genre: Angst, Confessions, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Soul Bond, Telepathic Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:48:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24741814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkhymns/pseuds/Darkhymns
Summary: At the Tower of Salvation, he could hear her voice again. It hadn't stopped there.
Relationships: Colette Brunel/Lloyd Irving
Series: Colloyd Week 2020 [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1780570
Comments: 6
Kudos: 8





	How Can I Keep You

**Author's Note:**

> For colloyd week day 7: Free Day. I'd fix this up more if I could but I had to leave it before I made it too complicated. Someday I'd like to make this idea better.

The stairs in the Tower of Salvation seemed never ending, along with the floating rows of coffins, all of them housing a person that must have been mentioned in class. Another Chosen failed, another person lost and tucked away into nothingness. He didn’t want Colette to be a part of this, her name lost to history. So he reached out to her, even as she seemed about to turn away.

His heart was beating against his ribs when he could hear her voice the moment their hands linked together, moving through his head as easily as the sunlight over his skin. _For some reason, I still feel like I want to cry._ And all he could offer was his own tears.

“Colette! If you realized what was going on, then why…?” But he hadn’t understood just then on his own terms, just how softly his blood was pulsing when her voice echoed inside him, sliding so effortlessly into that rhythm.

 _You can hear my voice?_ Colette was saying. Or not saying. He didn’t know what was right, not as he clutched at her hands, finding himself shaking while she remained so still. _I’m so happy! I can still say goodbye…_

But he clutched harder, so hard that it must have hurt her hands, except that she couldn’t feel anything, not even his own tears dripping down to clash against her skin.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Colette, I’m sorry…” His guilt pierced through him, gutted through his chest until he felt it open up, bare and grieving for her. _I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I love you so much. Please don’t leave me._

Even when he couldn’t speak, the flow of all his feelings came rushing out, like a torrent, and he wondered if it would overwhelm Colette. But she was looking at him, holding him back just as tight until an unseen force lifted her away.

_I love you too, Lloyd. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I’m sorry._

And maybe by then, he couldn’t tell their voices apart, even as she pulled away from his hands. She was in him, had always been in him, and he wanted to further crush her into his chest as much as he could to make that even truer. It was why it was so painful, like ripping off his very arm, when she had floated out of his reach.

Still, her voice resounded in her head. But it had always belonged so close to him. He didn’t realize the strangeness of it then.

* * *

Though they rushed through the Renegade Base, Colette stayed a fair distance away, wings out and casting a faint light across the floor. Sheena was unlocking the Rheiards from their holds, and time was running short.

“How do we bring Colette with us?” Genis was asking. “Would she just ride one of these herself?”

Sheena had taken a moment, biting her lip as she stared at the red-eyed girl, back straight and arms as still as unmoving weights. “She can come with me. I have some warding charms to help me if I really need it. I’ll keep her safe.”

Lloyd didn’t like the idea, but he said nothing yet, his head still rattling with so many other questions that he was unsure which to ask first.

And her voice cut right through them, a wave crashing upon a battered shore, smoothing out the dunes. It was muffled, warped, out of focus. But it was there.

_I want to stay with Lloyd._

He blinked. It had been just like at the tower, everything else shutting down the moment she spoke to him. He turned to her, finding no expression, but despite the hollowness he felt, he didn’t turn away. “Colette? Did you say something?”

Genis, who was standing next to him, turned to Lloyd with a questioning eyebrow. “Uh, Sheena was the one that just talked,” he supplied helpfully.

Lloyd started, eyes glancing to Genis before going back to Colette. She hadn’t turned, made no movement at all. But then-

 _Lloyd?_ Her voice soft and familiar, and slightly frightened too.

He shook his head, not sure what was happening. But if there was one thing he was good at it, it was thinking fast when the situation called for it. “I mean… I can take Colette with me on the Rheiard. She might fall while we’re in the air, so I can hold onto her.” He felt everyone’s eyes slide over to him, tried again to keep his reasoning sound. “She can be really slippery, you know!”

Now it was Raine’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Slippery?”

“You saying I can’t be trusted to keep her safe?” Sheena argued, and maybe this was another gamble, but Lloyd went with it, still remembering the cadence of Colette’s voice inside his skull.

“Not that, just…well, you tend to fall a lot also. And with Colette, that probably makes it harder on you!”

A soft pause before Genis’ snicker broke the silence. “Ha, he’s got a point, you know.”

Sheena frowned, but her flushed cheeks indicated that she was too embarrassed to keep arguing. “Fine. You can take her, but then I’d better not catch you dropping her either!”

Lloyd nodded, already going to Colette as he heard the weird metal contraptions unfold, like a bird stretching out its wings. “Colette?” he called out to her, timidly reaching for her hand.

He grasped it. She didn’t react or say anything else, slowly walking with him to the Rheiard. Had he just imagined it? As he went to his seat, she carefully sat behind him, hands reaching for his belts to grasp safely.

_Thank you._

He heard it again, soft and dim. Lloyd reached behind to grasp her hand one more time before going back to the Rheiard’s handles.

He had no idea what was going on, but either way, he’d keep Colette safe this time.

* * *

It was Raine who asked him straight off, just after everyone recovered from their shaky landing, (and Lloyd feeling much better that he had been the one to fly with Colette and keep his Rheiard from crashing too hard) about what he heard.

“Why did you think Colette was speaking with you earlier?” she asked. Her voice was asked in a low tone, not loud enough for either Genis or Sheena to hear. “She hasn’t been able to speak since the fourth seal.”

Lloyd considered his next words, still unsure himself, but the look in Raine’s eyes didn’t make him want to reveal much of anything, if at all. “I- I think I was just tired. I just got knocked out before we all had to run from those weird Renegades, remember?”

Raine looked unconvinced. “You did the same thing back at the tower. You acted like she was speaking.”

He had kept himself from saying anything too stupid, such as, ‘Didn’t you hear her too?’ But he remembered the way her voice had flowed all around him, like it was familiar, natural. So much a part of him.

“I just didn’t want her to leave,” he said, turning away. The pain he felt then was not forced. “I didn’t want to think how much I failed her.”

_Lloyd? Are you there?_

He stopped, looking to the far side of the cliff. So that hadn’t just been…

He then gave a quick glance back to his teacher, seeing Raine struggle with what to say, gripping her staff with her forefingers. “I’m sorry, Lloyd. It’s been hard for all of us. I just wanted to make sure you were okay and hadn’t suffered any brain trauma from that fight earlier.”

“Hey, you always say I have a pretty thick head,” he replied. He could only summon a small smile with his words. “I’m just gonna make sure Colette can find her way to camp.”

Raine was about to ask something else, he knew, but seemed to think better of it with the way she closed her lips then. Lloyd was thankful. “Not too long. You should get yourself some rest. We’ll be taking turns for the night, alright?”

He nodded, saying nothing more. He didn’t trust himself to say anything more. He went towards the cliff edge of the mountain they were camping in, guided by the soft light of pink painted against the black of the night sky.

Not even more than a few feet away did he hear her again. _Lloyd._

He wasn’t crazy. He wasn’t hearing things. It was her, reaching across whatever chasm that her angel state locked her in. It was Colette through and through.

He knew because as he reached for her hand, he felt something hold him back tight. Not her hand, but… _her_ , in a sense. Her own being. The muffled voice of hers grew clearer, stronger. _You can still hear me._

“Of course I can,” he said, grinning at her then. The spikes growing around his heart, ever since he thought he lost her, seemed to pull back, letting him breathe. “And…you still remember me?”

 _Yes!_ From that word, he could imagine her all happy, turning to him with a smile, the shell in front of him did none of that. She continued staring out across the sea of trees that made up this world of Tethe’alla, wings highlighting the golden waves of her hair. _I don’t feel as alone now._

“I promised I’d never leave you alone,” he stated. “So…you can hear me too. Can you hear everyone else?”

 _Mm,_ came back her echo, and he visualized her nodding to the question. _But…when I tried calling out to them before, they didn’t say anything. They couldn’t hear me. But you did._

His thumb rubbed against the back of her hand. Her voice in his head should have been scary, or at least he felt like that was what people would say. But he didn’t feel that at all. He felt like he was less alone.

“I guess I don’t really get it…but that means you can keep talking with me, can’t you?” Hope that had nearly died out when Colette floated away came flooding back, giving warmth to his limbs. “We can talk like before.”

 _Yeah…_ Her wings just barely brushed his shoulder, their span much larger than he recalled. But maybe it was because Colette usually didn’t have her wings out for this long. _Just sometimes…it’s hard to keep going. I keep wanting to sleep. Like something keeps calling for me, and it sounds so sad when it does._ A pause. _It’s a strange feeling. And… I know if I sleep, my body might do things that I don’t mean to do sometimes._

He squeezed her hand tighter. “Even if that happens, it’ll be okay. I’ll make sure to watch out for you.” He thought on something else then. “Can you see me though? Like… or is it different?” He still didn’t fully understand it.

 _I can see you, just sometimes…things are fuzzy. A little bit._ If Colette could move, she would be sighing, or clasping her hands together. Or were those just actions that he expected of her? _I feel like I’m moving through water. And that there’s.. something so sad that tries to keep pulling me back. What if…_

He knew the fear before she said it. Or…thought it. However this worked. But he smiled, taking a step closer. The others had said she was in self-defense mode, but he trusted Colette. “We’ll find a way to bring you back,” he said. “You won’t have to be stuck like this. Then you can move and talk again like you used to.”

He could feel Colette’s gratefulness through him – like a smile, like the soft ways she would hold his hand, even if the one in his own was still limp. _But also,_ she said then, a small lilt to her voice, like a giggle. _I kinda like talking like this with you. Like…it’s our secret. No one knows about it but us!_

“Heh…guess you’re right.” He looked over the forest with her, the wind pulling at his hair. It pulled at hers too, and it made him reach out to try and push back some of the strands from her face. “So like, secret conversations between us…” He thought on it. “It’s not too different from before, when you wrote on my hand. Except…I bet we can do this from anywhere!”

 _Yep! Maybe, even if we’re far away?_ Colette inquired.

“Yeah!” He had heard from far off just earlier, so it made sense to him. “If I’m stuck in a boring conversation, you can keep talking with me instead!”

 _Hehe. That way, we can never lose each other, can we?_ she asked him, her voice subdued.

He clung to her hand even more. If only she could feel it, but one day they would fix this. He had to believe in that. “You won’t ever lose me. I promise.” Then he tried something else, wondering if what they shared between them was a two-way street. He tried not to feel too embarrassed from it.

 _Because I’m always with you._ His thoughts traveled more clearly than they ever felt. They rushed to her like the path before him was clear. _Can you hear that?_

A few seconds before there was laughter again in his head. If he had told someone about that, they might have looked at him funny. But it was the laughter that he recognized. Less muffled, clear as the sky over Iselia on those sunny days.

 _I can hear you! So you can do it too._ Colette was as excited as if she had come across a cute puppy. _Does it hurt your head when you do it though? You’re scrunching your forehead a lot!_

 _Ah, no! I’m okay._ Immediately, Lloyd stopped trying to make a face. It was already feeling natural to speak to her this way, something about it making him feel comforted, despite the circumstances. _It’s just new to me. I should practice it._

 _We can keep practicing,_ Colette assured. The moonlight bounced off her crystal, the light looking so alive for a moment within. _I want to always keep talking with you._

Lloyd felt much easier about so many things now, even on this new world with her. He held her hand, picturing a smiling Colette that he could feel from her hidden voice.

And once he did that, he realized something else. Realized what had happened back at the seal.

 _Does that mean… you heard me before?_ he asked. Lloyd turned to face her fully instead of the forest. Whether by instinct, or if Colette could somehow control the soulless body that was once hers, she did the same, her boots crunching against the glass. _Back at the tower?_

In his head he heard a soft noise from her, like a gasp. She took a moment before answering him, the night air from this new world blowing gently against them. _I heard…that you…_

 _You said it too, didn’t you?_ He gripped both her hands, tried to see into her eyes that were blank and lifeless, but they were still Colette’s. She was still there. _That you loved me too._

Was it silly to talk like this? When she was so close to him, when he could still use his own voice? But something about whatever space they shared felt so personal, that it only belonged to them. Whatever happened at the tower made something open, made him feel something connect him to her even stronger than before.

He faced her, just as he did there. _I love you, Colette._

Colette seemed to know it just as well. _Lloyd…I…_

Her hands moved.

Lloyd didn’t realize the meaning of that, not until they rested against his chest, not until she moved close. His first instinct was to kiss her, as he had always wanted to. He wanted to kiss her deeply, carry her away from everything. And as she looked at him, the soft tinge of red leaving her eyes, he wondered if he truly could.

But something pulled her back. He felt it so keenly, like the wind buffeting against them both. She seemed to know it too.

_I’m sorry, Lloyd. I want to keep hearing you. I want…_

_Colette?_ he called out to her, from across that chasm. Her eyes blank pools of red, her hands moving back to her sides. Whatever thing that grabbed at her from within pulled her away from him, until only the echoes of her voice were left inside of his head.

In front of him stood Colette, soulless, as she had been at the tower.

Lloyd wondered then if all that had just happened had been in his head, if his mind had been so messed up, that he had imagined it all. “Colette…” he whispered aloud, feeling the weight bear down on him. Had he just been so wishful that he put it all on her?

Until he saw the tears falling from her eyes.

Lloyd watched quietly, letting one hand reach to touch her cheek. She didn’t push him away, didn’t act like the weapon that Yuan had kept saying she was. Something quiet nudged in his mind. Colette. Sleeping. It had been so long since she slept.

If he thought of it that way, she wasn’t gone. That was why they came here, to help her find her way back to her family, her friends…to him.

 _I’ll be here when you wake up, Colette,_ he said to her, his mouth shut, his thoughts traveling across the darkness in the hopes that it would reach her. He pressed his forehead to hers, watching for the girl that was gone but not. _I’ll keep listening for you._ If he focused more, he could feel the light that was her, just across from him.

He could feel her. And softly, before Colette would be pulled back to that sleep, to that darkness where a sad being wanted her to keep away that cold and jarring loneliness, _I can hear you, Lloyd_. She sounded so tired. Lloyd was frightened of what that meant, but he couldn’t let that fear overtake him. _I can hear you._ Then silence again, then rest.

Lloyd waited through the night, listening and listening for her voice to come back _._ He’d wait for as long as he could.


End file.
